amber
Nondik, Zatoz
Zatoz Nondik (1945- ) is a German researcher and founder of the Prehistoric Research Society (FGUD). He supports the idea of a pole shift 13,000 years ago(a), based on the orientation of various ancient monuments such as Stonehenge, Tikal and Nazca, among others[1084]. He has also written a book about Plato’s ‘orichalcum’, From 2012 to Oreichalkos[841], in which he describes in detail how the orichalcum may be related to Japanese lacquer and suitable for coating walls as described in the Atlantis narrative(b).
Nondik argues that to coat walls something other than a metal or molten amber was involved. However, I can’t help being reminded of the comments of Helen O’Clery who did note[494.52] that the ancients had mixed liquid amber with an oil to produce a form of paint.
*(a) See: https://web.archive.org/web/20130618122106/https://www.polverschiebung.de/index.html
(b) See: https://web.archive.org/web/20131126222154/https://polverschiebung.de/resultate_e.html*
Bischoff, Günter
Günter Bischoff (1950- ) has written (in German) a number of papers(a)(b) that strongly support Spanuth’s theory, which places Atlantis in the North Sea with the royal capital on a Helgoland larger than what we have today. He believes that its megalithic influence extended from Scandinavia and the British Isles on to North West France and southern Spain and the Western Mediterranean. He also includes central Europe and the Atlantic island groups in this loose confederation.
Bischoff also blames the Phaeton encounter for the destruction of the capital of Atlantis. Dale Drinnon has given us a translation(c) of Bischoff’s extensive paper on this matter. Further information is available on the Atlantisforschung.de website(d).
Bischoff has published two additional articles(g)(h) on the Atlantisforschung website which includes a comment that might account for the diversity of locations where apparent sightings of the comet were reported. “Now it is easy to explain why Phaethon should have been sighted over Greece, Egypt, Syria, India and other countries. During its orbits lasting several days, it will have flown over many inhabited areas on its elliptical orbit. Some observers may even have seen it several times and from different directions.”
In 1995, Bischoff published another paper once again supporting the theories of Jürgen Spanuth. However, what stands out for me is a closing paragraph about the work of Barry Fell where Bischoff ends with “Thus, the first Europeans reached the New World almost three millennia before the bold voyages of discovery of the Viking Leif Erikson.”(f)
In 2016, Bischoff published his ideas in book form with a volume entitled Atlantis und sein Zentrum Althelgoland (Atlantis and its center Althelgoland)[1216].
Bischoff also supports Spanuth in identifying amber as the orichalcum referred to by Plato and accepting the Sea Peoples as ‘North Sea’ Peoples.
Bischoff is due to give a lecture (in German) on his search for Atlantis, entitled Plato, Phaeton and Atlantis, on Saturday, July 8th, 2019, in Dresden(e).
(a) https://www.eichner-dresden.de/atlantis/
(b) SYNESIS-Magazin Nr. 83 (5/2007) https://www.efodon.de/
(c) See: Archive 3588
(d) https://atlantisforschung.de/index.php?title=G%C3%BCnter_Bischoff (German)
Kahlhofer, Eckart
Eckart Kahlhofer (1936- ) is a German entertainer(a) and Atlantis researcher who has recently added his support to the concept of Atlantis in North-West Europe echoing some of the ideas of Jürgen Spanuth. He identifies the invasions of the Sea Peoples with that of the Atlanteans during the 12th century BC. Like Spanuth he also equates orichalcum with amber. Among his more creative ideas is to identify the Shardana as coming from Sweden and similarly argue that the Philistines came from northwest Europe.
Additionally, he contends that the elephants referred to by Plato were in fact deer, claiming that a scribal error resulted in the Greek word elaphos (deer) being transcribed as elephas (elephant).
He strongly rejects the commonly accepted interpretation of Caphtor, contending that the term refers to the ‘pillar of heaven’ in the North Sea holding up the sky and personified by Atlas.(See: Archive 2809)
Kahlhofer also attacks the views of, Rudolf Steiner, Lewis Spence, Eberhard Zangger, the Schoppes and Aristotle.
Publication of his book[715], Atlantis in the Third Millennium, was imminent and due to have been available in English and German. However, he has now published an ebook with the title of Mit Atlantis–die andere Dimension (Atlantis: The Other Dimension) in German.
In October 2013, Kahlhofer published an English translation of a sample of his work. His latest book Der Atlantis Codex is now available as a free pdf file(b).
>Khalhofer has identified the ‘Nine Bows’ people referred to by Merenpth “as the coalition of Lebu, Turscha, Sekeles, Peleset, Theker, Denen, Sardana, Wasasa and Meschwesch coming from the north”, whom he had conquered. We would come to know them as the Sea Peoples(f).
Khalhofer notes that later Ramses III (Year 8) in the year 1175 BC, defeated the Sea Peoples whom he knew as the Nine Bow peoples from the North(g).<
He updated his website(c) and the English translation of Der Atlantis Codex in December 2019. Further amendments were added in January 2021(d).
>Kahlhofer continued to work on the text leading to a point where it is now (August 2021) a trilogy(e). It was no great surprise when Atlantis Codex 2022 was published. This is a 275-page book originally in German, but if you contact the author, he will send you an English translation(g).<
(a) https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0434764/
(b) DER ATLANTIS CODEX (archive.org) (English & German)
(c) http://www.atlantis-atlantis.de/
(d) Mail – Tony O’Connell – Outlook (live.com)
(f) THE ATLANTEANS ALIAS NINEBOWS | Meine Webseite (atlantis-atlantis.de) *
(g) ATLANTIS 2022 | Meine Webseite (atlantis-atlantis.de) *
Sweden
Sweden was claimed to be the location of Atlantis by Olaus (Olaf) Rudbeck in the 17th century. Before him another Swede, Johannes Bureus, expressed similar views. His friend Carl Lundius supported Rudbeck’s theories, but received none of the acclaim.
In the 18th century Carl Friedrich Baër was happy to follow a fashion, which placed Atlantis in the Holy Land. I am not aware of any major Swedish contribution to Atlantology in the 19th century.*However, the following century saw a number of Swedish researchers make valuable contributions to the subject.*
The discovery of the Mid Atlantic Ridge led René Malaise and Hans Pettersson to suggest the Azores as remnants of Atlantis, an idea still popular today. Around the same time Gunnar Rudberg proposed that Syracuse in Sicily had inspired some of Plato’s description of Atlantis. Arvid Högbom advocated the North Sea as the location of Atlantis in 1915, long before Jürgen Spanuth. In the same region Nils Bergquist opted for the Dogger Bank as has Ulf Erlingsson.
More recently, we seem to have come full circle as Bertil Falk has revived some of Rudbeck’s ideas(a) and a short illustrated 2007 paper (updated 2015)(b) by Robert Fritzius also added some additional modern support. However, for something quite different we have Carl Festin promoting a Mediterranean location.
*Nils-Axel Mörner and Bob Lind, two controversial researchers, have proposed, in a number of papers, that a Bronze Age trading centre existed in southeast Sweden, which had links with the Mycenaeans, Minoans and Phoenicians in the Mediterranean. They suggest that ancient references to Hyperborea may have been generated by this trade. However, although they do not associate Hyperborea with the story of Atlantis, they delivered their theories in papers presented to the Atlantis Conferences of 2008 [750.685] and 2011(c). They also touch on a number of other peripheral subjects including Cygnus, archaeoastronomy and amber. Similar views on early Baltic trade with the Mediterranean have been expressed elsewhere(d).*
(a) https://www.vof.se/folkvett/ar-1993/nr-4/platons-atlantis-diktning-som-tagits-pa-allvar/ (Swedish)
(b) See: https://web.archive.org/web/20100807201746/https://www.datasync.com/~rsf1/vel/atlantis.htm
(c) https://file.scirp.org/Html/1-1140054_59543.htm
Joseph, Frank *
Frank Joseph (1944- ) or more correctly Francis Joseph Collin, was born in Chicago. His father was Max Simon Cohen, who is said to have spent time in Dachau concentration camp. Incredibly, in the late seventies, Frank Joseph was the leader of the American Nazi Party. In 1981, Joseph was arrested and convicted of molesting young boys. He was released after serving three of a seven-year sentence (a)(b).
Since his release, he has established himself as an author, writing a number of books on Atlantis and Diffusionism[102–108]. In them, he has emphasised at length the enormous quantities of copper mined in ancient times in North America that he maintains were brought to Europe to feed the demand there, for bronze making. He maintains that this is clear evidence of trading contacts between the Old and New Worlds in prehistoric times. Among his more unusual claims are that Noah was an Atlantean and that the Trojan War was just part of the conflict with the Sea Peoples.
One of Joseph’s early books, Edgar Cayce’s Atlantis and Lemuria[106], was heavily criticised in some quarters(e) including an accusation of including in the book a ‘heavily retouched’ photo of the underwater Yonaguni site.
In Joseph’s The Destruction of Atlantis, he dates that event to 1198 BC(o) quoting such sources as the Ipuwer Papyrus and temple inscriptions at Medinet Habu.
He then claims that eight years later the Atlanteans re-emerged as the Meshwesh, one of the Sea Peoples, attacked Egypt and were defeated by Ramses III [1535]. The authoritative D’Amato & Salimbeti have identified the Meshwesh as possibly being a tribe related to the Libyans [1152.8].
The author concurs with others that the catastrophe was triggered by an impact from a comet/asteroid in the region of the Mid Atlantic Ridge. Joseph supports an Atlantis located in the Atlantic of which the Canary Islands and Azores(g) are among its remnants. He draws attention to the fact that The Laws by Plato also refers to the ‘Great Deluge’. In the same book, Joseph returns to his hobbyhorse of the huge amounts of copper that were mined in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in prehistoric times. He is convinced that Atlanteans carried out this massive extraction and transported it to the east to feed the emerging Bronze Age. This book is useful for someone coming to the subject for the first time but it contains little that new and is really just a reworking of existing material.
His next offering, The Atlantis Encyclopedia, was promoted as an encyclopaedia of Atlantis-related references, yet it omits any mention of many of the leading theories and their promoters, which is not what you would expect from such a reference work on the subject. It also suffers from an overabundance of references to Native American mythologies, which at best have only the shakiest connection with Plato’s Atlantis.
Although The Atlantis Encyclopedia was published in 2005, it was only recently (July 2022) that Thorwald C. Franke, in his newsletter #197(r), applied his very sharp scalpel to the contents of the book. Franke points out a number of errors, but reserves his most detailed criticism for Joseph’s entry relating to the ‘Third Reich’. Franke’s conclusion is that Joseph has produced ‘a really bad book’. When Franke’s comments are combined with the many errors that I have listed below, it is obvious that Frank Joseph is a most unreliable source of information regarding Atlantis.
He followed this with Survivors of Atlantis, a sequel to The Destruction of Atlantis, which focuses on four global catastrophes linked to the cyclical return of a comet, that led to the destruction of Atlantis and the subsequent dispersal of its survivors and their influence on the cultures of their adopted homelands. As usual, he returns to the mystery of the Michigan copper mines but covers a wide range of global prehistory speculating on possible links with Atlantis. Unlike its prequel, ‘Survivors’ does not include an index.
For a number of years, Joseph was editor-in-chief of Ancient American magazine(c), owned by Wayne May, a Mormon, whose church has a vested interest in demonstrating the existence of early, advanced pre-Columbian peoples in America. A one-hour lecture given by Joseph in 1997 is available on YouTube(h), in which he outlines a number of very early pre-Columbian contacts between West Africa, particularly Mali and the Americas that led to the giant stone heads being carved by the Olmecs.
In 2008, Joseph published Unearthing Ancient America in which he revisits the pre-Columbian remains of North America. As usual, he denounces orthodox archaeologists as a means to bolster his own extreme ideas. For example “Louisiana’s Poverty Point, the ‘oldest city in North America’, is a dead-ringer for Plato’s description of Atlantis…[108.178]”
With his book The Opening of the Ark of the Covenant[670] Joseph moved into slightly different territory, linking the Ark with Atlantis and the Templars. Joseph co-authored this book with Laura Beaudoin who claims to be a descendant of the founder of the Knights Templar in Jerusalem.
Not one to miss an opportunity, the prolific Mr Joseph then jumped on the 2012 bandwagon with the publication of Atlantis and 2012[694]. As the world did not end, Joseph revised this book and republished it as Atlantis and the Coming Ice Age[1074] in 2015. An excerpt is available online(i).
April 2012 saw Joseph as editor of Lost Worlds of Ancient America[824] which is an anthology of articles describing various pre-Columbian visitors from both east and west. It also includes a suggestion that the Bahamas had a landmass to match Plato’s description of Atlantis. Jason Colavito, a well-known sceptic, has written an extensive and highly critical review(f) of this collection of articles culled from the Ancient American magazine. While the book has little to do with Atlantis, Colavito’s comments cast doubts on Joseph’s credibility as well as that of the other contributors.
Before Atlantis[1459] was published by Joseph in 2013, in it he focuses on the ‘aquatic ape theory’(k) and the existence of ‘pre-human cultures’ going back 20 million years. Atlantis plays a minor part in this offering and it is probable that it is only in the title to assist sales! In May 2017, we have a report(l) of pre-human remains dated 7.2 million years ago being discovered in the Balkans. How Joseph can apply the term ‘culture’ to such primitive creatures is hard to understand.
In 2016, Joseph published Our Dolphin Ancestors [1871] in which he reveals that we and dolphins are both descended from the aquatic ape! For good measure, he “explores the ‘connections’ between dolphins and Atlantis and Lemuria.”
Joseph frequently touches on the subject of Lemuria and in 2006 published The Lost Civilisation of Lemuria [107] which was devoted to it. Leaving aside that Joseph equates Lemuria with Mu and that both names are inventions from Philip Sclater and Brasseur de Bourbourg respectively, the advertising blurb for his book tells us that “Joseph painstakingly re-creates a picture of this civilization in which people lived in rare harmony and possessed a sophisticated technology that allowed them to harness the weather, defy gravity, and conduct genetic investigations far beyond what is possible today.” This is reminiscent of some of the b.s.produced by Blavatsky and Cayce, among others.
Joseph then followed ‘Lost Worlds’ with Lost Colonies of Ancient America in 2014[1124], receiving rave reviews on Amazon, while Bradley T. Lepper(j) cites Larry Zimmermann(n), an archaeologist from Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, who offered a different view in the July/Oct 2015 edition of American Antiquity.
In 2014, Joseph republished Atlantis and Other Lost Worlds[636] as a paperback and a Kindle book. which is just a recycling of some of his earlier material and adds nothing of value. His reliance on speculation rather than evidence has not diminished. While his conjecture is bad enough, his misquoting of Plato is unforgivable. One example is his claim that Atlantis had 14,400 naval personnel, for 1,200 ships, which would mean that each ship had only a crew of 12! The only ships mentioned by Plato were triremes, which had a crew of 200(m). What Plato actually said (Critias 119a-b) was that in time of war each of the managers of the 60,000 allotments on the plain of Atlantis, had to supply four men for naval duty, which amounts to a total of 240,000 and matches the number of men required for 1200 triremes. This is just one of a number of similar errors in that passage. However, the same book also sets a record for the number of mistakes that Joseph managed to squeeze into a single sentence. At this point, I decided to look back at all my references to Joseph’s work and was shocked to find that he has been consistently guilty of at least sloppy research, if not dishonesty, and for me, must therefore be considered unreliable.
I was recently perusing the Kindle version of Atlantis and Other Lost Worlds and discovered a number of obvious inaccuracies. For example, Joseph refers to G.R.Corli as a French astronomer, whereas in fact his name was Carli and he was born in Capodistria, formerly Italian, but now part of Slovenia (loc.2511). Joseph claims that Carli believed that a fragment of a comet had hit the Earth, when, in fact, he had only postulated that a close encounter with a comet had occurred.
He added a ‘d’ to Edgerton Sykes name (loc. 2543, 3573) and removed the ‘e’ from that of Arthur C. Clarke (loc.2783). In an article in Atlantis Rising magazine #35(p), he retained the ‘d’ in Sykes’ name and described Hanns Hörbiger as a physicist when he was a mining engineer by profession. He also recycled his errors relating to Giovanni Rinaldo Carli mentioned above. Still, on the first page of the article, he claimed that meteorites were not recognised by the scientific establishment when Ignatius Donnelly wrote Ragnarok in 1884, when, according to Smithsonian magazine, meteorites were discussed much earlier, in 1803(q).
His section on the Atlantean Army and population(loc.312) is full of numerical errors. He has the whole population of Atlantis at over one million, whereas Plato tells us that on their own, the Atlantean armed forces totalled around a million, including 480,000 foot -soldiers, 120,000 horsemen, 160,000 manning the 10,000 heavy chariots and 60,000 light chariots, and 240,000 sailors. From this, Otto Muck extrapolated a total population of between 20 and 40 million for Atlantis. Joseph proposes that the 1,200 Atlantean ships were serviced and manned by 14,400 men (just twelve each). However, the triremes referred to by Plato, each required a crew of 140 rowers!
Joseph ends the book with a Bibliography, but heads it Biography!
This book was clearly not proofread and its research was slipshod. Unfortunately, this does not appear to have been an isolated example. I therefore decided to review all Atlantipedia entries that referred to Frank Joseph.
Amber is not exclusive to the Baltic and can be found in the Americas, Lebanon, Siberia, Australia and Japan. A highly prized blue amber is to be found in the Dominican Republic. Frank Joseph in an effort to support his speculations regarding mythical Electra claims[0636.109] that the Atlantic islands of the Azores, Madeira and the Canaries are one of the two major sources of amber. This is blatantly untrue, as revealed in a comprehensive website(a) by Susie Ward Aber, a mineralogist at Emporia State University, Kansas. Amber sources worldwide are listed, but nothing in the Atlantic. Mr Joseph has, once again, some explaining to do.
However, there is also another trend becoming more obvious, which is that there are an increasing number of instances, particularly on the internet, of the Ark of the Covenant being linked to Atlantis. There is, of course, no evidence ever offered to support such speculation. One of the most recent of these is Opening the Ark of the Covenant, co-authored by the inventive Frank Joseph, where he traces the Ark back to Atlantis. There are probably few people that don’t accept that the Ark had been a real artefact, while many doubt the reality of Atlantis. It is possible that by linking the two, the authors hope to achieve credibility transference from one to the other!
In his Atlantis Encyclopedia, Frank Joseph has suggested[104.33] that Atalya or Atalia was, through time, transformed into Italy, adding that Atalia means ‘Land of Atlas’. This entry has been copied on a number of websites. However, the etymology of ‘Italy’ is not clear, but the most common proposal is that “Latin Italia may derive from Oscan víteliú, meaning “[land] of young cattle” (from Latin vitulus “calf”, Umbrian vitlu), via Greek transmission (evidenced in the loss of initial digamma). The bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes”. In passing, I should mention that Plato tells us that the Atlanteans who controlled southern Italy as far as Tyrrhenia also had a bull cult.
The following excerpt from a paper entitled Atlantis and the Great Pyramid from the July/August 2006 edition of Atlantis Rising magazine. “They (the Egyptians) somehow foresaw some inevitable celestial catastrophe with a potential for extraordinary destructiveness. As the object’s orbit began to noticeably decay, ground observers concluded that an impact with our planet was unavoidable, and began to prepare for the event by constructing a device that would bolster earth’s ionosphere, thereby deflecting the course of the falling object. The pyramid builders erected their geo-transducer because they understood that the earth was periodically endangered by recurring cycles of celestial bombardments. The Great Pyramid was built to guard against future collisions from outer space.”
The Balearic Islands of the Western Mediterranean were not occupied until around 2200 BC. Although the two larger islands of Majorca and Minorca have many megalithic monuments, principally taulas and talayots, they have not, so far, been part of any Atlantis location theory. The only mention that I can find is the unsubstantiated claim by Frank Joseph[0104.66] that the early settlers were invaders from Atlantis.
Frank Joseph erroneously claims[0108.117] that the only known ‘Cerne’ was Cerne Abbas in England, the site of the famous naked giant carved into the chalk. There is certainly no suggestion of any Amazon invasion there and the physique of the giant was certainly never matched by even the most butch Amazon. There is also the island of Cerne off the west coast of Africa and mentioned in the voyage of Hanno. Furthermore, Cerne is mentioned by Diodorus Siculus (iii.54) and is considered by some to be the Tunisian island of Kerkennah. Clearly, there was more than one Cerne known in our ancient past and so, not for the first time, Joseph is blatantly wrong.
Joseph also proposed that copper was the foundation for the wealth of Atlantis. He is convinced that there is evidence of extensive copper mining activities in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula around 1000 BC. He refers to these miners as Atlanteans[0102] and maintains that the extracted copper was brought to the Mediterranean, as he claims that there is no trace of it in North America. Joseph offers no real evidence.
Frank Joseph incorrectly claimed in the July/August 2011 issue of Atlantis Rising magazine that DeCamp “formerly a staunch disbeliever in Atlantis, was later convinced it did indeed exist in south-coastal Iberia.” No evidence was offered for this wild claim.
Frank Joseph echoed others with the idea that “the Etruscans were themselves nothing more than the late Atlanteans who colonised western Italy, so their surviving material culture offers us a glimpse of Atlantis at is cultural height.”[0636.21] This is an odd claim as Plato twice, unambiguously, placed Tuscany (Tyrhennia) beyond Atlantean control (Tim.25b & Crit.114c).
Evaemon (Euaemon) is the name of one of the fourth pair (with Ampheres) of twins who became the first kings of Atlantis. Frank Joseph[0104] identifies Euaemon with the ‘pre-Celtic’ king of Ireland, Eremon! This is somewhat incorrect as the Milesians are generally accepted as having been Celtic, with Eremon being one of eight Milesian brothers who invaded Ireland from Spain and defeated the Tuatha dé Danaan.
I found more of Joseph’s entries relating to Ireland that were, for me, particularly annoying. The first was his entry in his Encyclopedia for ‘crannóg’ where he attempts to link it with a sunken city. Crannógs are small artificial islands built in lakes for defensive purposes. When abandoned they usually became covered in small trees. The word is derived from the Irish word crann which means a tree, while óg means young or small. There are many such crannógs to be found among the numerous lakes of County Leitrim where I live. My second gripe is the entry ‘Tir-nan-Og’, which should in fact be ‘Tir na nÓg’ which means Land of Youth, implying land of perpetual youth. There is no connection with Og or Ogygia. I respectfully suggest that Frank Joseph and anyone else should tread more warily when trying to link similar-sounding words from different languages.
Frank Joseph has related speculative ideas claiming that “the early date for New Grange, its circular construction, sophisticated solar orientation and mythic tradition all point to Atlantean origins.” [0636.70] A nonsensical conclusion based on nothing but his fertile imagination
Frank Joseph erroneously claims that Plato could not have been influenced by the Helike disaster, because according to Joseph the Atlantis dialogues were written 25 years before the obliteration of Helike[1074.14], when in fact Plato wrote his last dialogues about 25 years after the demise of Helike.
Lemmings are small rodents that primarily live in northern regions. Early zoologists and the more gullible readers assumed that the creatures have been seen committing mass suicide in an attempt to find their ancient homeland, Atlantis. Unfortunately, Frank Joseph[0102.51], among others, has chosen to perpetuate this canard. It should be obvious that if Atlantis had been destroyed 12,000 years ago, as Joseph claims, the lemmings should have all died out millennia ago due to their alleged destructive homing instinct.
Frank Joseph links the destruction of ‘Lemuria’ with the Plagues of Egypt [0106][0107]!
Frank Joseph contends[0636.42] that the Phaistos Disk was ‘a sophisticated astrological chart’ and ‘is an example of Atlantean Bronze Age technology’.
Frank Joseph contends that conflict between the Egyptians and the Sea Peoples was part of the Trojan War[0108.11] and has identified the Meshwesh, one of the Sea Peoples, as Atlantean [1535].
Christopher Volpe records that in 1906, Alexander Strath-Gordon founded the Atlantean Research Society, in East Orange, New Jersey. This date conflicts with the foundation date of 1928 proposed by Frank Joseph. A book published by Strath-Gordon in 1934 confirms the 1906 date on its cover and records him as the founder and life president of the Atlantean Research Society.
In view of all of the above, it is more than reasonable to classify Frank Joseph as unreliable.
(a) https://web.archive.org/web/20190127004837/https://www.flavinscorner.com/collin.htm
(b) https://web.archive.org/web/20100612064814/https://www.robertghostwolf.com/kimball.htm
(c) Ancient American Magazine (archive.org) *
(e) https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/atlantida_mu/esp_lemuria_4.htm
(f) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/1/post/2012/05/the-los-angeles-monolith-frank-josephs-archaeology-by-hearsay.html (and subsequent blogs)
(g) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgEgzGsc9DOpnLlIP5Q8DAQ
(h) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7n7kPnuZUY
(i) Archive 2627
(j) https://web.archive.org/web/20161204161137/http:/www.dispatch.com/content/stories/science/2015/09/20/01-book-about-americas-discovery-gets-it-all-wrong.html or See: Archive 2694
(k) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_ape_hypothesis
(m) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trireme#Crew
(o) https://www.newdawnmagazine.com/articles/eternal-atlantis
(p) Atlantis Rising magazine #35 http://pdfarchive.info/index.php?pages/At
(r) Review of: Frank Joseph, The Atlantis Encyclopedia – Atlantis-Scout
Eridanus
Eridanus is the name of a constellation in the Southern Hemisphere as well as the name of the only Atlantean river named by Plato (Crit. 112a). It has been identified with a number of waterways(b) including the Nile (Eratosthenes), the Eider (Spedicato)(d), the Rhine(f), the Istros (Danube) of Hungary(g) and the Po (H. S. Bellamy). Mythology has fiery Phaëton crashing into the Eridanus, which means ‘early burnt’.
Adding to the confusion is the existence of the River Eridanos, referred to by Plato (Phaedrus 229) which is a tributary of the Ilissos and is still partly visible in the centre of modern Athens(e). (see left image)
Jürgen Spanuth was convinced that it was as either the Elder or the Eider, which flow into the North Sea opposite Helgoland. Emilio Spedicato echoed Spanuth’s views in a number of more recent articles(c)(d) and opted for the Eider as the original Eridanus. The similarity of the two names also adds some credence to this idea.
The late Walter Baucum quoted[183.159] the Swiss historian and geographer, Frederic de Rougemont (1808-1876), who, in his 1866 book, L’Age de Bronze, ‘proved’ that originally the Rhine had been known as the Eridanus.
Apollonius of Rhodes in his Argonautica refers to the River Eridanus as flowing into the Cronian Sea(a), generally accepted as the North Atlantic. The Eridanus is frequently referred to in ancient Greek texts as an amber-rich river in Northern Europe. Amber was claimed by Spanuth to have been the Orichalcum of Plato’s Atlantis.
Kai Helge Wirth[627], a German geographer, has advanced the controversial theory that the configuration of the constellations was chosen to conform with the outlines of various Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts and was used as navigational aids to ancient mariners. As part of this radical idea, Wirth has pointed out that the constellation Eridanus closely follows the meandering Eider rather than the Po.
Geologists have given the name Eridanus to a river which flowed where the Baltic is now located. Claudius Ptolemy identified the River Duna, which flows into the Gulf of Riga in the Baltic, as the Eridanus.
(a) http://www.theoi.com/Text/ApolloniusRhodius4.html
(b) Star Tales – Eridanus (ianridpath.com)
(c) https://www.2008-paris-conference.org/mapage13/phaethon-to-chapamacac.pdf
(d) Wayback Machine (archive.org) *
(e) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eridanos_(Athens)
(f) https://www.bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Topical.show/RTD/CGG/ID/2236/Danube.htm
(g) https://www.theoi.com/Potamos/PotamosEridanos.html
Orichalcum
Orichalcum is, according to legend, reputed to have been ‘invented’ by Cadmus noted in Greek mythology as the legendary Phoenician founder of Boeotian Thebes. This metal is one of the many mysteries in Plato’s Atlantis narrative. It is mentioned five times in the Critias [114e, 116c-d, 119c] as a metal extensively used in Atlantis. I am not aware of any reference to it anywhere else in his writings, a fact that can be advanced as evidence of the veracity of his Atlantis story. Plato took the time to explain to his audience why the kings of Atlantis have Hellenised names. However, he introduces Orichalcum into the story without explanation, which suggests that the metal was something well-known to the listeners. It is therefore natural to expect that metals might play an important part in determining the credibility of any proposed Atlantis location.
Bronze was an alloy of copper and tin, while brass was a mixture of copper and zinc, their similarity is such that museums today refer to artefacts made of either refer to them as copper alloys.
According to James Bramwell[195.91], Albert Rivaud demonstrated that the term ‘orichalcum’ was known before Plato and not just invented by him. Similarly, Zhirov notes that both Homer and Hesiod refer to the metal[0458.46], as does Ibycus, the 6th century BC poet, who compares its appearance to gold suggesting a brasslike alloy. Thomas Taylor (1825) noted that in a fragment from a lost book of Proclus, he seems to refer to orichalcum under the name of migma(c).>Virgil in his Aeneid mentioned that the breastplate of Turnus was “stiff with gold and white orachalc”.<
Wikipedia also adds that “Orichalcum is also mentioned in the Antiquities of the Jews – Book VIII, sect. 88 by Josephus, who stated that the vessels in the Temple of Solomon were made of orichalcum (or a bronze that was like gold in beauty). Pliny the Elder points out that the metal had lost currency due to the mines being exhausted. Pseudo-Aristotle in ‘De mirabilibus auscultationibus’ describes orichalcum as a shining metal obtained during the smelting of copper with the addition of ‘calmia’, a kind of earth formerly found on the shores of the Black Sea, which is attributed to be zinc oxide.”
Friedrich Netolitzky (1875-1945) offered an independent interpretation of the oriharukon (orichalcum) in Plato’s Atlantis account, which he identified as an artificial modification of white gold (known as Asem in ancient Egypt).
Atlantisforschung also offers a lengthy article on orichalcum(p).
Orichalcum, or its equivalent Latin Aurichalcum, is usually translated as ‘golden copper’ referring to either its colour or composition (80% copper and 20% zinc) or both. However, Webster’s Dictionary translates it as ‘mountain-copper’ from ‘oros’ meaning mountain and ‘chalchos’ meaning copper.
Sir Desmond Lee described the metal as ‘imaginary’ without explaining away the classical references or the fact that ”In numismatics, orichalcum is the name given to a brass-like alloy of copper and zinc used for the Roman sestertius and dupondius(r). Very similar in composition to modern brass, it had a golden-yellow color when freshly struck. In coinage, orichalcum’s value was nearly double reddish copper or bronze. Because production cost was similar to copper or bronze, orichalcum’s formulation and production were highly profitable government secrets.”(m)
Modern writers have offered a range of conflicting explanations for both the origin and nature of orichalcum. A sober overview of the subject is provided by the Coin and Bullion Pages website(d).
In 1926 Paul Borchardt recounted Berber traditions that recalled a lost City of Brass. Salah Salim Ali, the Iraqi scholar, points[0077] out that a number of medieval Arabic writers referred to an ancient ‘City of Brass’ echoing the Orichalcum-covered walls of Plato’s Atlantis.
Ivan Tournier, a regular contributor to the French journal Atlantis proposed that orichalcum was composed of copper and beryllium. Tournier’s conclusion seems to have been influenced by the discovery in 1936 at Assuit in Egypt of a type of scalpel made from such an alloy(e). An English translation of Tournier’s paper was published in Atlantean Research (Vol 2. No.6, Feb/Mar.1950). In the same edition of A.R. Egerton Sykes adds a few comments of his own on the subject(r).
An unusual suggestion was made by Michael Hübner who noted that “small pieces of a reddish lime plaster with an addition of mica were discovered close to a rampart” in his chosen Atlantis location of South Morocco. He links this with Plato’s orichalcum but does so without any great enthusiasm.
Jim Allen, promoter of the Atlantis in Bolivia theory, claims that a natural alloy of gold and copper is unique to the Andes. Tumbaga is the name given by the Spaniards to a non-specific alloy of gold and copper found in South America. However, an alloy of the two that has 15-40% copper, melts at 200 Co degrees less than gold. Dr. Karen Olsen Bruhns, an archaeologist at San Francisco State University wrote in her book, Ancient South America[0497], “Copper and copper alloy objects were routinely gilded or silvered, the original colour apparently not being much valued. The gilded copper objects were often made of an alloy, which came to be very important in all of South and Central American metallurgy: tumbaga. This is a gold-copper alloy that is significantly harder than copper, but which retains its flexibility when hammered. It is thus ideally suited to the formation of elaborate objects made of hammered sheet metal. In addition, it casts well and melts at a lower temperature than copper, always a consideration when fuel sources for a draught were the wind and men’s lungs. The alloy could be made to look like pure gold by treatment of the finished face with an acid solution to dissolve the copper, and then by hammering or polishing to join the gold, giving a uniformly gold surface”.
Enrico Mattievich also believed that orichalcum had been mined in the Peruvian Andes(b).
Jürgen Spanuth tried to equate Orichalch with amber. Paul Dunbavin links Orichalcum with Wales. Robert Ishoy implies a connection between obsidian and Orichalcum, an idea also promoted by Christian & Siegfried Schoppe.
The most exotic suggestion has come from Felice Vinci who equates it with platinum[019.286] which was probably brought from the Ural Mountains. The most recent (2023) identification of orichalcum, which Plato tells us was used as wall cladding in Atlantis, came from Graham Phillips who also suggested[2063] that it was platinum! Incidentally, platinum was not discovered by Europeans until the eighteenth century in South America.
Albert Slosman thought that there was a connection between Moroccan oricalcita, a copper derivative, and Plato’s orichalcum. Peter Daughtrey has offered [893.82] a solution from a little further north in Portugal where the ancient Kunii people of the region used ori or oro as the word for gold and at that period used calcos for copper.
Thorwald C. Franke has suggested[750.174] that two sulphur compounds, realgar and orpiment whose fiery and sometimes translucent appearance might have been Plato’s orichalcum. His chosen location for Atlantis, Sicily, is a leading source of sulphur and some of its compounds. I doubt this explanation as realgar disintegrates with prolonged exposure to sunlight, while both it and orpiment, a toxin, could not be described as metals in any way comparable with gold and silver as stated by Plato.
Frank Joseph translates orichalcum as ‘gleaming or superior copper’ rather than the more correct ‘mountain copper’ and then links Plato’s metal with the ancient copper mines of the Upper Great Lakes. Joseph follows Egerton Sykes in associating ‘findrine’, a metal referred to in old Irish epics, with orichalcum. However, findrine was usually described as white bronze, unlike the reddish hue of orichalcum.
Ulf Erlingsson suggested [319.61] that orichalcum was ochre, which is normally yellow, but red when burnt. He seems to have based this on his translation of the text Critias116b. In fact, the passage describes the citadel flashing in a fiery manner, but it does not specify a colour!
Other writers have suggested that orichalcum was bronze, an idea that conflicts with a 9600 BC date for the destruction of Atlantis since the archaeological evidence indicates the earliest use of bronze was around 6000 years later.
Thérêse Ghembaza has kindly drawn my attention to two quotations from Pliny the Elder and Ovid that offer possible explanations for Plato’s orichalcum(n). The former refers to a Cypriot copper mixed with gold which gave a fiery colour and is called pyropus, while Ovid also refers to a cladding of pyropus. She also mentions auricupride(Cu3Au), an alloy that may be connected with orichalcum.
Zatoz Nondik, a German researcher, has written a book about Plato’s ‘orichalcum’, From 2012 to Oreichalkos[0841], in which he describes, in detail, how the orichalcum may be related to Japanese lacquer and suitable for coating walls as described in the Atlantis(b) narrative!
The fact is that copper and gold mixtures, both natural and manmade, have been found in various parts of the world and have been eagerly seized upon as support for different Atlantis location theories. A third of all gold is produced as a by-product of copper, lead, and zinc production.
It is also recorded that on ancient Crete, in the Aegean, two types of gold were found, one of which was a deep red developed by the addition of copper. Don Ingram suggests that the reddish gold produced in ancient Ireland is what Plato was referring to.
Irrespective of what orichalcum actually was, I think it is obvious that it was more appropriate to the Bronze Age than 9,600 BC. Furthermore, it occurs to me that Plato, who was so careful to explain or Hellenise foreign words so as not to confuse his Athenian audience, appears to assume that orichalcum is not an alien term to his audience.
The result of all of this is that Orichalcum has been advanced to support the location of Atlantis in North and South America, Sundaland, Ireland, Britain and the Aegean. Once again an unintentional lack of clarity in Plato’s text hampers a clear-cut identification of the location of Atlantis.
A fascinating anecdote relating to the use of a term similar to ‘orichalcum’ to describe a mixture of copper and gold was used by a metalsmith in Dubai as recently as 2007 and is recounted on the Internet(a).
The Wikipedia entry(f) for ‘orichalcum’ adds further classical references to this mysterious metal.
2015 began with a report that 47 ingots of ‘orichalcum’ had been found in a shipwreck off the coast of Sicily, near Gela, and dated to around 600 BC(g). What I cannot understand is that since we never knew the exact composition of Plato’s alloy, how can anyone today determine that these salvaged ingots are the same metal? Thorwald C. Franke has more scholarly comments on offer(h). Jason Colavito has also applied his debunking talents to the subject(i). In June of the same year, Christos Djonis, in an article(j) on the Ancient Origins website, wrote a sober review of the media coverage of the shipwreck. He also added some interesting background history on the origin of the word ‘orichalcum’.
An analysis revealed(k) that those ingots were composed of 75-80% copper, 15-20% zinc, and traces of nickel, lead and iron, but no proof that this particular alloy was orichalcum. The recovery of a further 39 ingots from the wreck was reported in February 2017 and the excavation of the sunken ship continues.
An extensive paper(o) on the Gela discovery reported: “that Professor Sebastiano Tusa, an archaeologist at the office of the Superintendent of the Sea in Sicily, claimed the metal they had discovered in the remains of the ship was probably the mythical and highly prized red metal orichalcum.” However, dissent was not long coming, as the paper also notes that “ Enrico Mattievich, a former physics professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, believes the metal has its origins in the Chavin civilisation that developed in the Peruvian Andes in around 1,200 BC. He claims the metal alloy is made from copper, gold and silver. He claims that the discovery off the coast of Gela is not true orichalcum.” I think that both are probably wrong as we do not know the exact chemical composition of Plato’s orichalcum and both are just engaging in speculation.
The most recent explanation for the term comes from Dhani Irwanto who has proposed that orichalcum refers to a form zircon(l) that is plentiful on the Indonesian island of Kalimantan, where he has hypothesised that the Plain of Atlantis was located [1093.110].
(a) Problems with Atlantis – Aquiziam (archive.org)
(b) https://www.migration-diffusion.info/article.php?year=2011&id=268
(c) https://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/flwp/flwp26.htm
(d) https://www.coinandbullionpages.com/gold-alloys/orichalcum.html
(e) Atlantis Research Vol 2. No.6, Feb/Mar 1950, p.86
(f) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orichalcum
(g) See: Archive 2460
(h) https://www.atlantis-scout.de/atlantis_newsl_archive.htm
(k) From Fiction to Fact: Ancient Metal Identified with XRF – Analyzing Metals (archive.org) *
(l) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zircon
(m) https://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=orichalcum
(n) See: Archive 3456
(p) Oriharukon – Atlantisforschung.de (atlantisforschung-de.translate.goog)
(q) http://www.oocities.org/motorcity/factory/2583/orich.htm
(r) http://www.jaysromanhistory.com/romeweb//engineer/art11.htm
Obsidian
Obsidian is a glassy rock produced as a consequence of rhyolitic volcanic eruptions and is usually dark blue. It was highly prized during the Stone Age when it was found to produce good sharp edges, suitable for tools and weapons when fractured. Michael Grant remarked[661] ”it is the first traded substance of which there are material remains”.
Recent excavations in Northern Israel have revealed the use of obsidian tools over six thousand years ago(e). The nearest source of obsidian was Anatolia, so these pre-Canaanite people must have had trade links that extended at least that far.
It is interesting to read that obsidian was also considered valuable in North America around 7000 BC, when obsidian artifacts were discovered at an underwater site in Lake Huron, using material that had been brought from central Oregon 2,000 miles away(h).
In 2011 it was reported(b) that a new technique, which permitted the dating of obsidian, revealed that the Greek island of Melos saw the mining of obsidian as early as 15,000 years ago and its exportation throughout the Aegean and beyond, which also is evidence of extensive marine travel at that early date. However, 13,000 BC saw sea levels much lower than at present, as the Ice Age glaciation was still in place. This would have led to greater land exposure in the Aegean with shorter distances between islands, which were easily crossed with relatively primitive boats.
Massimo Rapisarda has noted that the only obsidian west of the Aegean in the Mediterranean is to be found in the Central region on the islands of Lipari, Palmarola, Pantelleria and Sardinia(g). A graduate thesis(f) by Barbara A. Vargo, explores in great detail the characteristics, history and distribution of Pantellerian obsidian.
Robert Ishoy who advocates a Sardinian location for Atlantis suggested(a) that obsidian, “commonly used on ancient Sardinia” was the mysterious orichalcum referred to by Plato. On the other hand. Christian and Siegfried Schoppe, who support a Black Sea location also identify obsidian as orichalcum. This is quite improbable, as obsidian would not easily lend itself to being used as wall cladding. This idea is even more impractical than Jürgen Spanuth’s proposal that orichalcum was a reference to amber. Apart from that orichalcum was described by Plato (Critias 116b-d) as a metal not rock.
Dr Ellery Frahm at the University of Sheffield has now developed a method whereby a piece of obsidian can be traced, not only to a particular volcano but to a specific quarry at the volcano(c).
In September 2013, Frahm revealed(d) that a new technique had been developed that permits the sourcing of obsidian artefacts in just 10 seconds.
In 2017 Robert H. Tykot published a very detailed paper on the sourcing and distribution of obsidian in the Central Mediterranean.(i)
Egyptologist Jan Summers Duffy published a short paper in 2021 regarding the use of obsidian in Ancient Egypt(j).
(a) http://www.atlantisdiscovered.org/thesis.htm
(b) Evidence for Earliest Obsidian Trade Found in Aegean – Biblical Archaeology Society (archive.org) *
(f) https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2500&context=etd
(g) https://www.maxrap.it/atlantide/atlantisobsidian.htm
(h) https://phys.org/news/2021-06-underwater-site-team-year-old-stone.html
(i) 162 PR Tykot 2017 Open Archaeology.pdf (usf.edu)
(j) (99+) Obsidian in Ancient Egypt- General Academic Letters | Dr. Jan Summers (Duffy) – Academia.edu *
Amber
Amber was known to the ancient Greeks as electron and ancient myth has it that it was first created when Phaëton drove across the heavens. In Germanic languages, it is called Bernstein meaning ‘stones that burn’. Since ancient times, it was brought from northern Europe to the Mediterranean. Jürgen Spanuth[002.47] was convinced that amber was in fact the orichalcum that Plato claimed to have adorned the walls of Atlantis. Spanuth’s theory is based on the fact that amber was mined in large quantities in the Baltic region as well as
Eiderstedt opposite Heligoland where he was convinced that Atlantis had been located. In ancient times amber was second only to gold in value. Although Spanuth’s location theory is carefully argued and was initially well-received, it has received diminishing support in recent years.
My initial reaction to the idea of amber as orichalcum was one of incredulity, but this was somewhat assuaged when I read the following comment in Helen O’Clery’s book “It was well known to the ancients that amber could be liquefied by heat and that by adding oil was possible to use it as a paint”[494.52]. Spanuth also noted this use of liquid amber[017.92].
Ellis Peterson notes(b) that an Egyptian tomb inscription records that around 1500 BC the Haunebu, claimed by him to be the (North) Sea Peoples sent a gift of 8943 pounds of amber to ThutmosesIII. There were a number of amber trade routes between the Baltic and the Mediterranean, dating as far back as the middle of the fourth millennium BC indicated by beads found in pharaonic tombs.(f) Traffic was apparently two-way as Egyptian beads from 3,400 years ago have been discovered in Denmark and thought “to be from the workshop that made the blue beads buried with the famous boy-king Tutankhamun.” (g)
Amber is not exclusive to the Baltic and can be found in the Americas, Lebanon, Siberia, Australia and Japan(i). However, 90% of amber comes from the Russian Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad(i). A highly prized blue-tinted amber is found in the Dominican Republic(c). While Baltic stocks of amber have diminished, it was reported that in 1966, Dominican miners, in less than ideal conditions, extracted 4,000 pounds of amber every month(h). Today, Myanmar (Burma) is the leading source of amber, where in even more appalling conditions, 10 tons of it are recovered every year.>>However, a 2006 article suggests that Poland alone has amber deposits of 650,000 tons(j).<<
Frank Joseph in an effort to support his speculations regarding the mythical Electra claims[636.109] that the Atlantic islands of the Azores, Madeira and the Canaries are one of the two major sources of amber. This is blatantly untrue, as revealed in a comprehensive website(a) by Susie Ward Aber, a mineralogist at Emporia State University, Kansas. Amber sources worldwide are listed, but nothing in the Atlantic. Mr Joseph has some explaining to do.
In August 2018 a paper from the University of Cambridge published in Plos One offered evidence that amber found in Iberia had come from Sicily two thousand years before Baltic amber reached the Mediterranean. It also appeared that the Sicilian amber had not been traded directly with Iberia but had been routed through North Africa.(e)
A report in 2010 revealed that the 3,550-year-old skeleton of a teenage boy discovered 5 km from Stonehenge was adorned with an amber necklace, indicating his high status and perhaps just as interesting was that a study of his teeth revealed that he had come from the Mediterranean(d).
Over three thousand years later the King of Prussia presented Peter the Great of Russia with an Amber Room which was eventually installed, using 100,000 pieces, in the Catherine Palace in Pushkin near St. Petersburg. It was looted by the Nazis during the war and was never found again, although still thought to be somewhere in Germany. Nevertheless, a replica was reconstructed and after 25 years was opened to the public in 2003. It required $11 million to reproduce what was once described as the “Eight Wonder of the World”
(a) https://web.archive.org/web/20200315191323/https://academic.emporia.edu/abersusa/amber.htm
(b) https://hiddenhistorysecrets.blogspot.com/2008_01_01_archive.html
(c) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_amber
(d) https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11421593
(e) https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-08/uoc-sai082818.php
(f) https://www.amberartisans.com/amberroutes1.html
(g) https://www.haaretz.com/amp/archaeology/kig-tut-beads-found-in-3-400y-old-danish-graves-1.5414758
(i) 90% Of Amber Is Extracted Here – English Russia (archive.org)
(j) https://www.iol.co.za/technology/amber-an-ancient-treasure-that-grew-on-trees-294269 *
Stonehenge *
Stonehenge is part of what is now arguably the most extensive and complex megalithic site in Europe. It was actually purchased in 1915 for a sum equivalent today (2020) to £680,000 by Cecil Chubb, a barrister, who later gave it to the nation(aa).
Professor Howard Goldbaum’s excellent website on Irish megaliths recounts that “According to legend the monument was once situated in Co. Kildare, southwest of Dublin. As explained by Geoffrey of Monmouth (c. 1100 – c. 1155), Merlin the magician moved Stonehenge from Ireland to England to serve as a memorial for the hundreds of Britons treacherously slain by the Saxons during a truce meeting on Salisbury Plain. In this story, which Geoffrey claimed was based on an older work he had found, King Ambrosium Aurelianus (uncle of King Arthur) wanted to build a memorial for his dead warriors which would last forever, but his builders could think of no way of doing it. Merlin provided the solution: go to Ireland and bring back the one that’s there.”(bw) One explanation for this comment may stem from the fact that in ancient times parts of Wales were controlled by the Irish!(db) This comment also highlights the unreliability of Geoffrey of Monmouth as the Saxons did not arrive in Britain until at least a couple of millennia after Stonehenge was erected.
In more recent times, Emmet Sweeney has also attempted to link the Arthurian legend with Stonehenge which he suggests had been Arthur’s ‘round table’. The blurb for his 2001 book Arthur and Stonehenge [0918]goes further stating that “As for Arthur himself, he was the primitive bear-god ‘Artos’, the Celtic version of Hercules. Originally portrayed with a bear-skin over his head and shoulders and carrying a great oaken club, he became the prototype of the Greek Hercules when Hellenic traders, braving the wild waters of the Atlantic in search of tin, heard his story from the Britons.”
National Geographic (August 2022) relates that historian Henry of Huntingdon, writing around 1130 – offers the first known reference to Stonehenge in print (sic), declaring it to be one of the wonders of England(cj).
Two depictions of Stonehenge exist which go back as far as medieval times, with a third recently added by Professor Christian Heck(ai). Sometimes claimed to have been known in medieval times as Chorea Giganticum. Little serious study of the monument was undertaken until the 17th-century antiquarians, and predecessors of archaeologists took an interest.
A recent paper by Austin Mardon et al, delves into the history of Stonehenge including its excavation and restoration attempts((cy). “One of the earliest excavations to discover what is beneath Stonehenge was undertaken by the Duke of Buckingham on behalf of King James I in 1620. The Duke of Buckingham, a friend of King James I, went to Stonehenge and ordered servants to dig a deep pit in the middle. Though the Duke hoped to find interesting relics, gold or other treasures (to please the King), he was only able to find animal bones and charcoal. King James was very intrigued by the Duke of Buckingham’s discovery and asked the architect Inigo Jones to conduct his own investigation of Stonehenge. Inigo Jones was a very famous architect during this time who had studied architecture from all over the world. Upon investigation, he recognized the uniqueness of the Stonehenge monument and hence proposed that a highly-skilled architect from ancient Rome could have possibly come to England to design the structure. Jones believed that the native Britons of ancient times certainly did not build Stonehenge. Jones’s theory was later refuted in the mid-1600s by medical doctor Walter Charlton who examined Stonehenge himself. According to Charlton, Danish Viking invaders had erected stones several years ago as a place to crown their kings. Though Charlton later published a book about Stonehenge’s origin, there is very little evidence for his theory, and only a small number of people agree with it.”
“In the 17th century, archaeologist John Aubrey made the claim that Stonehenge was the work of the Celtic high priests known as the Druids, a theory widely popularised by the antiquarian William Stukeley [1696], who had unearthed primitive graves at the site” (Wikipedia)(ci).
In 1877, the British historian Frederic Harrison wanted to bury a very large ‘time capsule’ beneath Stonehenge. His bold plan envisioned this ‘capsule’ to be the size of a small museum!(dc).
Mike Parker Pearson, arguably today’s leading archaeologist working at Stonehenge has published a paper titled Researching Stonehenge: Theories Past and Present, in which he reviews the range of opinions that the site has generated from the time of William Flinders Petrie in the 19th century until now(cq).
Dimitar Dimitrov, a Bulgarian researcher, has also published a book on the historical references to Stonehenge, but in conclusion, he thinks that the monument was simply used as a royal palace that included a ‘coronation stone’!(cr).
In the 19th century, H. S. Warleigh, Vicar of Ashchurch in England, was convinced that the biblical Nephilim had been responsible for the building of the Egyptian pyramids and Stonehenge among other ancient structures. Jason Colavito located this reference(ck).
More recently in response to the question “Who built Stonehenge? One creationist claims to have the answer: Giants. Not just any giants, either. Theologist Dr. Dennis Lindsay, president and CEO of Christ For The Nations, claims Satan created a race of giants to build the ancient megalithic site. Speaking last week on the TV show hosted by disgraced televangelist Jim Bakker, Lindsay announced that Satan had created the giants to infiltrate and destroy Israel. It’s not clear how arranging stones to align with the sun on the solstice in England would help destroy Israel, but that didn’t stop Lindsay — who has no background in archaeology listed on his website — from pressing the case.”(dd).
What is not generally known is that the monument has been subjected to numerous ‘restorations’ over the past hundred years and what we see today is actually a 20th-century vision of the original site. One website(au) shows a large series of images recording some of these renovations. There is evidence that at least one stone was re-erected a metre and a half from its original position.
Photos from 1867 show parts of Stonehenge, before later ‘restorations’ altered their earlier positions(ax), originally released by the UK’s Ordnance Survey(ay). In the course of the 1958 restoration, Robert Phillips had to remove a cylindrical core from Stone 58, which he kept. 60 years later the core was returned enabling geochemical tests to be carried out(cb). This was most fortunate as Stonehenge’s protected status would not permit a core to be removed today.
New technology has now revealed the existence of another henge less than a kilometre from Stonehenge (BBC Focus October 2010). We were next presented with evidence that an early form of ball bearings may have been used to move the large stones with which the monument was constructed(d). Other recent discoveries in the vicinity include the 3,550-year-old skeleton of a teenage boy buried with a rare amber necklace – a clear indication of status. Furthermore, a dental analysis revealed that he had come from the Mediterranean region.
Paul Dunbavin has published a paper(cu) on the Academia.edu website in response to the overreaction in the British media to the DNA research by Brace et al: “Population Replacement in Early Neolithic Britain” published in Nature, April 2019 suggesting that the origins of the Stonehenge builders may have been in the Aegean.
One example is the UK’s Independent newspaper which published an article, which claimed that “The ancestors of the Britons who built Stonehenge were farmers who had travelled from an area near modern Turkey, arriving around 4000 BC, and who rapidly replaced local hunter-gatherer populations, according to new research”(bo). This DNA evidence is also referenced in a recent National Geographic article(cj). Dunbavin’s point was that, before DNA was discovered, it was already generally accepted that migrants from the eastern Mediterranean had arrived in Britain and Ireland via Spain during the Neolithic Period.
In 2022, Paul Dunbavin also published a paper ‘Stonehenge Blindness’, which was prompted by “Two papers published in recent academic media (that) reveal a transformation in the attitude of archaeologists towards the concept of astronomical alignments at Stonehenge and other Neolithic monuments. It may be worthwhile to look back at why it has taken them so long to reach this consensus. Part of the problem lies in the theological divide that persisted for half a century between field archaeologists and archaeoastronomers; but also, the dogma about ‘Iron Age Celts’ which held that there could be no connection between the Druid astronomy described in classical sources and the earlier ‘pre-Celts’. Now that DNA science has removed this artificial barrier we may see that Neolithic people were far more competent astronomers than was previously supposed.”(da)
Stonehenge is not the only site to have its area of interest expanded in recent years. The 2018 drought in Ireland and the UK had produced evidence of a previously unknown henge situated not too far from Newgrange, Ireland’s best-known megalithic site(az). This new location has been dubbed ‘dronehenge’. Anthony Murphy, one of its discoverers, has written about the story of its discovery.[1762]
Similar sites have been revealed throughout these islands as a result of the current (July 2018) dry period.
October 2015 gave us a report(ad) that a semi-permanent structure was discovered about a mile east of Stonehenge and dated to be 1,300 years earlier than the more famous megalithic edifice.
The two big questions relating to Stonehenge are its exact purpose and the method of construction.
Allied to that is the question of how the ‘bluestones’ were transported from Wales. Was it by humans or glaciers(aj). However, an early theory proposed that the ‘bluestones’ were deposited by glaciers much closer to the Stonehenge site. This idea was quickly debunked but has once again surfaced in a new book [1565] by Brian John(bt).
What may have been a much earlier precursor to Stonehenge’s calendrical features, tentatively dated as 10,000 years old, has been identified in Scotland’s Aberdeenshire(f). This is now arguably the world’s oldest lunar calendar, although an incised stone found in southern Italy has now been put forward(bg) with a similar claim. I doubt that the Guinness Book of Records will be adjudicating on this one.
We were next presented with evidence that an early form of ball-bearing may have been used to move the large stones with which the monument was constructed(d). Stone balls, some intricately carved, were also discovered near megalithic monuments in Scotland, Ireland and Norway, while in Malta, stone balls have been found in the vicinity of the ancient temples there – some still in situ under the stones.
Keith Critchlow in his fully illustrated Time Stands Still [1518] claims that the carved stones found in Scotland display knowledge of Platonic solids a thousand years before Plato!
Crichton E M. Miller, who is best known for his studies of the pre-Christian ‘Celtic Cross’ and its use for navigation, surveying, and astronomy during the Bronze Age has now turned his attention to those mysterious carved stone balls and their possible time-keeping function(co).
Michael Poynder has noted that plain balls were also found at the Loughcrew site in Ireland [1748]. Even more intriguing, is that a similarly carved stone ball was discovered at Tiwanaku in Bolivia, which Hugh Newman has drawn attention to in a YouTube video(bi)!
In 2004, Gordon Pipes put forward a radical new ‘stone-rowing’ method of construction(ac), which requires minimal manpower and equipment. In 2009, Pipes expanded on this idea in book form [1126].
Some years later Steven Tasker put forward an alternative transportation theory that he claims could have been used to move the Stonehenge monoliths from Wales and goes as far as to suggest that the ancient Egyptians may have used a similar method to move the blocks for the pyramids(cc).
The Ancient-Wisdom.com website has an interesting item regarding the use of balls and tracks in 1770 to shift very heavy weights, noting that “The largest stone ever (recently) recorded to have been moved purely by human power alone is the famous ‘Thunder Stone’ from Russia, which was moved to St. Petersburg from the Gulf of Finland. It was rolled along on small balls placed on a track (Only 100m in length) at a rate of 150m per day.”(ba)(bb).
In 2019, archaeologists at Newcastle University put forward the idea that lard (pig fat) had been used to grease the sledges that were used to transport the huge stones(bh). “Fat residues on shards of pottery found at Durrington Walls, near Stonehenge, have long been assumed to be connected with feeding the many hundreds of people that came from across Britain to help construct the ancient monument. But a new analysis by archaeologists at Newcastle University in the UK suggests that because the fragments came from dishes that would have been the size and shape of buckets, not cooking or serving dishes, they could have been used for the collection and storage of tallow – a form of animal fat.“
More discoveries are expected as investigations continue. In 2014, it was announced that although most attention is focused on the rising sun at the summer solstice, it is now thought that Stonehenge was more likely to have been concerned with the midwinter setting sun(m). This opinion has been voiced by many, including archaeologist Anthony Johnson in his Solving Stonehenge [1794.253].
Another form of solar association was put forward some years ago by John Ivimy (1911- ) in his first book The Sphinx and the Megaliths [1829], in which he proposed “that Stonehenge was in fact an Egyptian colony, established for political reasons by the priests of the sun god Ra.”
It is worth mentioning that as early as 1906, Norman Lockyer (1836-1920), a respected scientist and amateur astronomer raised the possibility that Stonehenge had astronomical significance(bq). Wikipedia noted that “Lockyer is among the pioneers of archaeoastronomy. Travelling in 1890 in Greece he noticed the east-west orientation of many temples, in Egypt he found the orientation of temples to sunrise at midsummer and towards Sirius. Assuming the orientation of the Heel-Stone of Stonehenge to sunrise at midsummer he calculated the construction of the monument to have taken place in 1680 BC. Radiocarbon dating in 1952 gave a date of 1800 BC.”
In the 1960s, it was Gerald Hawkins who set a cat among the pigeons with the publication of his Stonehenge Decoded [1613]+. in which he proposed that the monument was in fact used as an astronomical computer. Many of the leading astronomers and archaeologists of the day offered apoplectic responses. Hawkins went as far as to suggest that the 56 Aubrey Holes at Stonehenge functioned as eclipse predictors, an idea endorsed by Fred Hoyle [1614]. How this can be achieved is outlined on the internet(by). ohn Edwin Wood in Sun, Moon & Standing Stones [1951.76] preferred Hoyle’s method over Hawkin’s. A 1999 paper has proposed a simpler method than those put forward by either Hawkins or Hoyle(ap).
I am reminded that one of the suggested functions of the Antikythera Mechanism was predicting eclipses(bz).
Another theory has recently been advanced by Thomas O. Mills which suggests that Stonehenge was aligned with the position of the North Pole as it was situated around 10,000 BC, as proposed earlier by Charles Hapgood.(u)
Conventional wisdom has it that Newgrange was built around 3200 BC, while Stonehenge was built in six stages between 3000 and 1520 BCE. Of course, there are dissenters, such as Yair Davidy, who made the following unusual claim on the Brit-Am website – “Dolmens and Megalithic Monuments originated in Ancient Israel. Jeremiah 31:21 says that the Ten Lost Tribes will construct a trail of Megalithic Monuments from Israel to their places of exile and evidence of this path will enable them to return. Such a trail exists! It is the Trail of the Dolmens from the Middle East to the West.”(cs). Professor W.A. Liebenberg has written a longer piece(ct). on the ‘Ten Lost Tribes’ as the builders of the megaliths. However, since the megalithic building period is generally accepted to have lasted from around 4000 BC until 1500 BC, this created a problem for Davidy and Liebenberg (D & L). The disappearance of the Lost Tribes is dated to around 700 BC leading to their dispersal and proposed megalith building as they travelled. D & L include Newgrange and by extension Stonehenge) among their monuments and that is where their difficulties begin. Both claim that before 700 BC the year was 360 days in length (after Velikovsky [037.128]) rather than our present 365 days. They argue that if Newgrange (among other monuments) had been built when we had a 360-day year the sun would not still light up the interior at the winter solstice. Therefore, they conclude that most megaliths were erected AFTER 700 BC! It just shows that if you combine the Bible with a fertile imagination you can prove anything.
Paul D. Burley has published a two-part paper(q)(r) on Stonehenge, which draws attention to the fact that most commentators have focused on the solar or lunar significance of the site’s alignments which he feels is in stark contrast to other European megalithic monuments that would appear to have been designed with stellar alignments in mind. Burley is the author of Stonehenge: As Above, So Below[1045].
In 1995 Duncan Steel suggested in his book, Rogue Asteroids and Doomsday Comets [0562], that Stonehenge I had been constructed as a predictor of the Earth’s intersection with the path of a comet and its attendant debris, which had a 19-year periodicity(x).
Graham Philips in his most recent (2019) offering, Wisdomkeepers of Stonehenge [1914] has a different approach to understanding Stonehenge, as explained by the cover notes “Graham argues that, with stones aligned to the sun, stars, and positions of the moon, stone circles were not just astronomical calendars, as some scholars have proposed, but were part of an elaborate system to determine precise timings necessary for the cultivation of medicinal plants. The Druids, he reveals, had medical knowledge well beyond their time, and may even have found a cure for cancer. Graham also discovers that the Megalithic people developed phenomenal memory techniques, resulting in a priesthood that became both the guardians of the stone circles and the living libraries of inherited knowledge. Wisdom keepers of Stonehenge uncover the long-forgotten secrets of the Megalithic people and the true extent of their astonishing achievements: a vast network of monuments, as important to the ancient peoples of the British Isles as the internet is to us today. The true purpose of Stonehenge is ultimately revealed. It was not just a religious monument, but served a vital, practical function – as a prehistoric healthcare facility.”
It was a pleasant change when in March 2022 Professor Timothy Darvill of Bournemouth University offered the results of a new analysis of Stonehenge’s intended function, which is much simpler and arguably more credible than some of the suggestions noted above. Darvill claims that the site was a calendar based on a tropical year of 365.25 days. “The proposed calendar works in a very straightforward way. Each of the 30 stones in the sarsen circle represents a day within a month, itself divided into three weeks each of 10 days,” said Professor Darvill, noting that distinctive stones in the circle mark the start of each week.(ce)
Stonehenge, among other megalithic structures, has been linked by various writers with Plato’s Atlantis. One extreme example of this, from John Nichols, is the suggestion that if the number of Aubrey Holes, 56, is multiplied by the diameter of the Aubrey Circle we get 16,200 feet which is “the exact diameter of Plato’s Atlantis”.(bv) Now, a ten-minute search on the Internet reveals FIVE different figures for the diameter of the Circle, ranging from 271.6’ to 288’. Combining that with the uncertainty attached to the value of the unit of measurement employed by Plato, it is clear that any claim of a connection between the Aubrey Holes and Atlantis is at best tenuous and at worst foolish.
Jürgen Spanuth suggested that the five trilithons “most probably represented five sets of twins.” [0015.85], an idea echoed later by Dieter Braasch(as). Spanuth was adamant that a commonly held view linking Stonehenge with Hyperborea was incorrect as Hyperboreans had come from Jutland.
Two Swedish researchers, Nils-Axel Mörner & Bob G. Lind have proposed(bm) that the Ales Stones in Sweden were built with the same basic geometry and using the megalithic yard as a standard of measure as Stonehenge.
Harry Sivertsen has written a paper about the metrology of Stonehenge with the ingenious title of ‘The Metrology of Stonehenge’. In it, he pulls together data from Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, Welsh churches and, of course, Stonehenge(cm).
The late Philip Coppens echoed(b) the views of a fellow Belgian, Marcel Mestdagh, that there might be a connection between monuments within the Stonehenge Heritage Site and Atlantis, namely Woodhenge, which comprised of posts arranged in six concentric circles. The suggestion is that this arrangement is in some manner a reflection of the concentric features in Atlantis described by Plato. I can only consider this to be highly speculative, somewhat akin to the suggestion(c) that Stonehenge I was an earthquake predictor.
In March 2015, the UK’s MailOnline published an article(ch) concerning some sites with unexplained concentric circles in China’s Gobi Desert. The article notes some superficial similarities with Stonehenge. Paolo Marini [0713]. also claimed that the concentric circles of Atlantis are reflected in the layout of Stonehenge! In 2011, Shoji Yoshinori suggested that Stonehenge was a 1/24thscale model of Atlantis(cg). He includes a fascinating image in the pdf.
For those interested, a recently reconstructed German counterpart of Woodhenge has the original dated to 2300 BC(aq). A Portuguese ‘woodhenge’ was reported in 2020(bk), which is thought to be the work of the Bell Beaker people (3500 – 2000 BC).
However, in the meanwhile, we will have to be content with a recent book by Professor Mike Parker-Pearson, Stonehenge: Exploring the Greatest Stone Age Mystery [839], which includes all the discoveries revealed by the recent ten years of investigation.
A 2014 offering from Professor David P. Gregg, The Stonehenge Codes [977], throws further light on the mathematics used for the building and development of Stonehenge over a 1500-year period was consistently the same polygon geometry. Gregg has also identified an earlier Babylonian influence. His book has considerable numerical content that many will find heavy going. Some of the text of the book is available online(j). The July 2014 edition of the BBC Focus magazine offers evidence that the history of the Stonehenge location can be traced to nearer the end of the Ice Age.
It has been generally accepted for many years that the bluestones (spotted dolerites) at Stonehenge had been brought from the Preseli Mountains of Wales. Now (Nov.2013) evidence has been presented that identifies the precise outcrop, Carn Goedog, as their source(h).
However, in November 2015, a report threw doubt on the existence of a Neolithic quarry in the Preseli Hills(ag). Confusingly, the following month it was reported(ah) that studies carried out in Wales suggested that the stones had been erected there first before their transportation to Wiltshire. In May 2016, the controversial matter of the method of transportation from Wales was claimed to have been resolved when it was demonstrated by students from University College London, supervised by Parker-Pearson that the bluestones could have been mounted on a sycamore sleigh and dragged along timbers requiring far less effort than was previously expected.(ao) Parker-Pearson believes that originally the stones had been part of a Welsh tomb that was dismantled and brought to Wiltshire as the successors migrated westward(ap). There is now a search underway to locate the site of the original monument in Wales.
In 2004, Jennifer Viegas from Discovery News (June 14) suggested that Stonehenge had been built by Welshmen based on remains found in builders’ graves found close to Stonehenge(bx).
A further twist to the Welsh connection was proposed in a 2021 paper(bs), again in Antiquity, when a team of archaeologists proposed that the Stonehenge bluestones may have been taken from one or more pre-existing stone circles. One candidate is to be found at the remains of the dismantled Waun Mawn circle in the Preseli Hills(be). A few years ago Robin Heath published Proto Stonehenge in Wales [1853] which expanded on this Welsh connection.
“A century has passed since British geologist Herbert Henry Thomas published his seminal 1923 study on Stonehenge, in which he traced the origin of the “bluestones” that make up the monument’s inner circle to the Preseli Hills in western Wales. Among these bluestones — so called because they acquire a bluish tinge when wet or freshly broken and to distinguish them from the “sarsen” stones that make up the outer circle — Thomas included a 16-foot-long (4.9 meters) flat-lying, gray-green slab of stone known as the Altar Stone.
It now appears that Thomas’ assessment was flawed, Richard Bevins and his colleagues have found in a new study, published in the October (2023) issue of the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports. While Thomas “quite rightly” pinpointed the source of some stones to outcrops in western Wales, the Altar Stone likely came from a completely different location, possibly an unknown quarry in northern Britain, Bevins said.”(cv)
Parker-Pearson published a paper in the February 2019 edition of Antiquity in which he reports on his research at the Welsh site, where he found some of the tools used to extract the pillars and determined the method of transportation(bc).
The transportation question received new attention with a study that suggested that “to move these stones such long distances, the builders likely manoeuvred them onto timber sledges and rolled these over logs,” using pig fat as a lubricant to minimise the friction between the sled and the logs. It is suggested that ceramic vessels, with high concentrations of pig fat, found on-site at Durrington Walls, may have been used to collect fat from the carcasses as they were roasted on a spit, which was then stored as lard or tallow! (bf) My question is, how many pigs are needed to grease a path for a stone from Wales to Stonehenge?
Further investigation has produced the claim by Paul Devereux that the rock there was chosen because of its acoustic qualities(I), raising the possibility that Stonehenge was the site of the first ‘rock’ concert. A more wide-ranging essay on the subject of archaeoacoustics is available online(ak). Robert Hensey notes [1766.40] that acoustic experiments have been carried out inside Newgrange and Cairns I & L at Loughcrew, while in the Orkneys, Aaron Watson and David Keating have investigated sound effects at two passage tombs.
According to Trevor Cox, professor of acoustic engineering at England’s Salford University, the Neolithic temple (of Stonehenge) had unique properties capable of significantly altering and amplifying speech and musical sounds(cf). His theories were also explored in a June 2023 article on the BBC website(cp).
After centuries of being described as one of the wonders of the megalithic world, the construction skills of Stonehenge’s builders have been harshly criticised by Professor Ronald Hutton of Bristol University, who went as far as to describe them as ‘cowboy builders’(n).
In 2012, Gordon Freeman, a Canadian scientist, published Hidden Stonehenge [891] in which he offers an extensive study of a Native American “medicine wheel” in Alberta and compares its astronomical alignments with that of Stonehenge, revealing ‘incredible’ similarities(bu). His book highlights the use of sophisticated astronomical knowledge at both locations, in the very distant past suggesting cultural links millennia before Columbus!
Although full scientific investigation has yet to be carried out, a circle of standing stones submerged of the coast in Lake Michigan, initial reports are intriguing(cx). However, until properly studied, wild speculation has offered some outlandish theories regarding the date, builders and purpose of these stones.
A somewhat cruder but equally effective winter solstice alignment was recently identified in the Chilean Andes(aw).
A site in Australia discovered in the first half of the last century by Frederic Slater (President of the Australian Archaeological Society) and dubbed ‘Australia’s Stonehenge’ was bulldozed in 1940 on the orders of the Australian Government! The location, obviously, never as impressive as its namesake on Salisbury Plain, has been again identified and using drawings made over seventy years ago has enabled a computer-generated image of the site to be made(t). A father and son team, Steven & Evan Strong have recently relocated to the damaged site(af).
In the Strait of Sicily, a ‘Stonehenge’ has been identified on the small island of Lampedusa, by Diego Ratti and described on a generously illustrated website(e). However, the application of the term to almost any megalithic monument, particularly by the media, has debased its value.
In May 2013, Melville Nicholls published a Kindle ebook, Children of the Sea God, in which he argues strongly for a Stonehenge built by Atlanteans, better known as the Bell Beaker People!
Robert John Langdon has now proposed(g) that Stonehenge was constructed by megalith builders, around 8500 BC, who had migrated from Doggerland/Atlantis as it became submerged and that the Altar Stone at Stonehenge points to Doggerland! Langdon is highly critical of the generally accepted interpretation of various features found at Stonehenge, listing13 items that he claims “don’t make sense”(bp).
John Chaple has drawn attention to a letter from Quintus to his brother Marcus Tullius Cicero regarding the construction of Stonehenge, possibly based on information received from Druids!” The temples of the Britons are raised and constructed in a circular form, with obelisks of stone, over which are imposts, all of huge dimensions untouched by the chisel; a peace offering to Geranius, or Apollo, the sun. The huge stones of which they are composed, lay scattered by the hand of nature on the plain: these, with myriads of labourers, the high priest caused to be rolled up on the inclined planes of solid earth, which had been formed by the excavation of trenches, until they had attained a height equal to their own altitude; these pits being dug, they were launched from the terrace and sunk so as to stand perpendicular, at due and equal distances in the circle, and over these were placed others horizontally. After having completed one circle, they formed another that is concentric at some distance, and towards the extremity of the area of the inner circle, they placed a huge stone for the purpose of religious rites. When the sun enters into Cancer, [mid summer] is the greatest festival of the god; and on all high mountains and eminences of the country, they light fires at the approach of that day, and make their wives, their children, and their cattle, to pass through the fire, or to present themselves before the fire in honour of the deity. Deep and profound is the silence of the multitude during this ceremony, the appearance of the sun above the horizon, when, with loud and continued exclamations, and songs of joy, they hail the utmost of that luminary, as the supreme triumph of the symbol of the god of their adoration.”(cw)
Shoji Yoshinori has suggested that Stonehenge was intended as a model of Atlantis(k), as had also the late Philip Coppens(b).
It is quite obvious that more convincing evidence is required if any claim of a Stonehenge/Atlantis connection is to gain greater traction. In 2018, David L. Hildebrandt published Atlantis – The Awakening [1602], in which he endeavoured to do just that with a mass of material that he claims supports the idea of Atlantis in Britain and Stonehenge as the remnants of the Temple of Poseidon. He suggests that the five trilithons represent the five sets of male twins, an idea voiced by Jürgen Spanuth and more recently by Dieter Braasch. Even earlier George H. Cooper proposed Stonehenge as the Pillars of Herakles. I am not convinced by the spirited defence of his hypothesis, as I consider his date too early and the location too far from Athens or Egypt to consider them to be within ‘easy striking distance’ for the purpose of invasion.
Jürgen Spanuth claimed that “Among the racecourses of the Bronze Age still in existence today must be counted the stone circle of Stonehenge which must have been erected by men of the Atlantean culture many centuries before the Atlantis report was written. The racecourse at Stonehenge, in its original, immense dimensions, cannot be an imitation of a Greek stadium.” [017.126]
As recent as the summer of 2014 evidence was accidentally discovered(o) that suggested that the Stonehenge megalithic stones form a complete circle. Commenting on the discovery Susan Greaney from English Heritage said “A lot of people assume we’ve excavated the entire site and everything we’re ever going to know about the monument is known, but actually there’s quite a lot we still don’t know and there’s quite a lot that can be discovered just through non-excavation methods.” An extensive digital mapping project carried out at Stonehenge by researchers from the University of Birmingham and the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Vienna has revealed, “that the area around Stonehenge is teeming with previously unseen archaeology and that the application of new technology can transform how archaeologists and the wider public understand one of the best-studied landscapes on Earth.”(p)
December 2014 saw an encampment site just 1.5 miles from Stonehenge has its date confirmed at around 4000 BC(s).
Marden Henge, situated between Stonehenge and Avebury is reckoned to be ten times bigger than Stonehenge and has now (2015) seen the start of a three-year, £1,00,000, dig by 80 archaeologists hoping to unlock its secrets(a). Dr Jim Leary, a leading archaeologist working at the site is convinced that Marden may turn out to be more significant than Stonehenge(w).
Earlier in 2015 Tim Daw, a steward at the Stonehenge site claimed that he had discovered a previously unknown alignment, involving a line of stones at 80 degrees to the axis of the monument. His theory is that the tallest stone at Stonehenge points towards the midsummer sunset and has been observed to be correct(v).
Some years ago a University of Manchester team led by Professor Julian Thomas explained that “The Stonehenge Cursus is a 100-metre wide mile-long area which runs about 500 metres north of Stonehenge.” which we have now “dated at about 3,500 years BC – 500 years older than the circle itself.”(ca)
The archaeological importance of Stonehenge was boosted further in September 2015 with the announcement that a line of nearly 100 buried stones had been discovered just a mile away, beside the Durrington Walls ‘superhenge’(y). There are images available, including a short video clip relating to this new discovery(z). Subsequent excavations revealed no stones, but 90 holes that had held wooden posts.(bn)
In June 2020, the significance of Durrington was greatly enhanced by the revelation that adjacent to the ‘Walls’ is a series of shafts five metres deep and ten metres in diameter. The shafts are arranged in a circle having a diameter of 1.2 miles. The site is 1.9 miles northeast of Stonehenge(bj). Further comment was published in November 2021(cd).
In November 2015, the New York Times published an updated overview(ae) of the various excavations that have taken place in the vicinity of Stonehenge.
Sarah Ewbank has now offered us a fascinating new theory regarding the original purpose and plan of Stonehenge. In a fully illustrated website(al) she reveals that the structure was conceived as “a ‘Cathedral-like’ building with a massive oak-framed roof, and a huge hall at its centre.”
Further discoveries are listed on the Heritage England website(ab). What is not listed there is the information that Stonehenge was constructed by giants on the instruction of the Devil! This b.s. tidbit was imparted to us in April 2016 by Dr Dennis Lindsay on the TV show of disgraced US evangelist Jim Bakker(am). Another blog from Jason Colavito exposed further Stonehenge nonsense, this time from New Zealander, Ted Harper, who has recently claimed that the Wiltshire monument together with the Great Pyramid, both warn of a meteor strike in 2020.
Theories relating to Stonehenge and Atlantis seem to proliferate at comparable rates. In a new book, The Memory Code [1258], by Lynne Kelly, she proposes that the Wiltshire monument is a giant mnemonic(ar) and that other megalithic sites also were.
July 2017, saw a BBC review of the recent acceptance of Stonehenge as just a part of a huge complex of monuments, with a hint of more to come(at).
In June 2019, Dr Christophe Snoeck, a Belgian archaeological scientist offered evidence for the origins of some of the cremated human remains discovered at Stonehenge. “During his doctoral research, he developed a method to extract information about the geographical origin of cremated individuals.“ This method, he says, “was applied to 25 cremated individuals from Stonehenge and our results show that 40% (10 out of 25 analysed individuals) did not live near Stonehenge in the last decade or so prior to their deaths but came from further away. Some might actually have originated from west Wales where the bluestones came from, some 250 km away,” he adds. “This shows the importance of the site in the British landscape during the Neolithic period.” (bd) Italian scientists have also been working on new ways of gleaning information from cremated remains(be).
In 2020, it was announced that acoustic engineers from the University of Salford had demonstrated that Stonehenge had acoustic qualities that allowed “any sounds produced inside the temple would have been much less audible to anybody outside the circle, despite the monument almost certainly not having a roof.
The findings, therefore, suggest that any sounds generated by activities carried out inside the circle were not intended to be shared with the wider community. This reinforces theories suggesting that the potential religious activities conducted inside Stonehenge were reserved for an elite of practitioners, rather than for a wider communal congregation.”(bl)
In May 1922 NG published its first photo of Stonehenge, now, a century later, it returned to this remarkable monument for its cover story in a 2022 edition(cj). It highlights how the use of new technologies has greatly enhanced our knowledge of the site and the people who built it. Jim Leary, a lecturer in field archaeology at the University of York admits that “a lot of the things we were taught as undergraduates in the 1990s we know now simply aren’t true.” This beautifully illustrated article is a useful update on developments at this huge UNESCO World Heritage Site.
In the February 2023 edition of the Antiquity journal it published a paper by Giulio Magli and Juan Antonio Belmonte that effectively debunked many of the various theories relating to Stonehenge put forward over the past seventy years. “All in all, the alleged “Neolithic” solar-precise Stonehenge calendar is shown to be a purely modern construct whose archaeoastronomical and calendrical bases are flawed.”(cn)
“English Heritage announces today [15/4/2024] a ground-breaking project to explore the connection between Stonehenge and the Moon during the ‘major lunar standstill’ which occurs this year, and into next.
Along with experts from Oxford, Leicester and Bournemouth Universities and the Royal Astronomical Society, the charity will embark on a series of investigations to research the alignment of the ancient stones with the moonrise and moonset during this almost once-in a generation period.
During a major lunar standstill, the northernmost and southernmost positions of the Moon are at their furthest apart along the horizon, and it is believed that these distinct lunar movements may have been observed during the early phase of Stonehenge, potentially influencing the later monument’s design and purpose. With a major lunar standstill occurring only every 18.6 years, Professor Clive Ruggles of University of Leicester, Dr Fabio Silva of Bournemouth University and Dr Amanda Chadburn of Bournemouth University and the University of Oxford have seized the rare chance to research the phenomena.”(cz)
[1613]+ Available online: https://archive.org/details/stonehengedecode00gera/mode/2up
[1696]+ https://archive.org/details/b30448554/page/n8/mode/2up
(a) Daily Express, Fri. June 19, 2015
(b) See Archive 2140
(c) https://lunaticoutpost.com/showthread.php?tid=11497
(d) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/11/101130010931.htm
(e) See: Archive 2211 (text only)
(f) https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-23286928(g) https://robertjohnlangdon.blogspot.co.uk/#!/2013/06/stonehenge-atlantis-momentous-discovery.html
(h) https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-25004282
(h) https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-25004282
(j) https://old.world-mysteries.com/gw_DavidGregg.htm
(k) https://www.pipi.jp/~exa/kodai/kaimei/stonehenge_is_small_atrantis_eng.pdf
(m) BBC Focus Magazine, July 2014, p.51
(n)https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2671664/Stonehenge-built-cowboys-lasted-well.html
(p) https://lbi-archpro.org/cs/stonehenge/ *
(q) https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-europe/solving-enigma-stonehenge-001616
(s) https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-wiltshire-30540914
(t) https://www.grahamhancock.com/forum/StrongSE2.php
(u) https://www.mondovista.com/stone.new.html
(v) https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-wiltshire-33205212
(x) See Archive 2657
(z) https://www.lbiarchpro-imagery.at/stonehenge2015 (link broken) See (p) *
(aa) https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-34282849
(ab) https://heritagecalling.com/2015/09/23/7-new-discoveries-about-stonehenge/
(ac) https://heritageaction.wordpress.com/2016/05/26/how-did-they-move-the-bluestones/
(ae) Stonehenge Begins to Yield Its Secrets – The New York Times (archive.org)
(ai) See Archive 2832
(aj) https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/stonehenges-bluestones-were-moved-wales-10591475
(ak) https://dailygrail.com/Hidden-History/2016/1/Archaeoacoustics-Listening-the-Sounds-History
(ar) https://www.thecourier.com.au/story/4104488/the-palace-of-memory/
(at) https://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20170713-why-stonehenge-was-built
(au) The images of Stonehenge they don’t want you to see – Ancient Code (archive.org)
(av) https://www.livescience.com/62619-did-glaciers-carry-stonehenge-bluestones.html
(ax) https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/victorian-stonehenge-picnic-photos
(ay) https://issuu.com/os012/docs/stonehenge_a4_pdf
(az) https://www.rte.ie/news/leinster/2018/0711/977969-newgrange/
(ba) https://web.archive.org/web/20190601213915/https://www.ancient-wisdom.com/extremasonry.htm
(bb) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bronze_Horseman
(bc) https://www.livescience.com/64801-stonehenge-temporary-monument.html
(be) https://www.latimes.com/science/new-way-to-decode-burned-bones-story.html
(bf) https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/07/ancient-people-may-have-used-pig-fat-build-stonehenge
(bg) https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/lunar-calendar-0012340
(bh) https://bradshawfoundation.com/news/world_heritage.php?id=Moving-the-stones-of-Stonehenge
(bi) https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/arqueologia/esp_esferas_costarica05.htm
(bk) https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/perdigoes-neolithic-woodhenge-0014084
(bn) ‘New Stonehenge’ was made of WOOD | Daily Mail Online
(bp) The Post Glacial Flooding Hypothesis: The Great Stonehenge Hoax (archive.org)
(bq) Stonehenge Astronomically Considered Index (sacred-texts.com)
(bt) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/south_west/5072664.stm
(bu) https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2009/01/29/alberta_sun_temple_has_5000yearold_calendar.html
(bv) https://jjswn35.wordpress.com/article/atlantis-eden-how-to-find-2vfxjftuay98o-9/
(bw) Stonehenge – Voices from the Dawn
(bx) Archive 6480 | (atlantipedia.ie)
(by) PREDICTING ECLIPSES WITH THE STONEHENGE (archive.org)
(bz) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-018-0210-9
(ca) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080610095001.htm
(cb) https://www.livescience.com/stonehenge-pillars-mesozoic.html
(cc) Stonehenge: Did ancient ‘machine’ move stones from Wales? – BBC News
(ce) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/03/220301192407.htm
(cf) ADVANCED ACOUSTICS AT STONEHENGE – ATLANTIS RISING THE RESEARCH REPORT
(cg) http://www.pipi.jp/~exa/kodai/kaimei/stonehenge_is_small_atrantis_eng.pdf
(ci) https://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/sac/index.htm
(cj) National Geographic, August 2022
(ck) The Victorian Vicar Who Thought the Nephilim Built Stonehenge and the Pyramids – JASON COLAVITO
(cl) https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1999AAS…195.9201C/abstract
(cm) (99+) The Metrology of Stonehenge 2020 | Harry Sivertsen – Academia.edu
(cn) https://phys.org/news/2023-03-stonehenge-calendar-shown-modern.html
(co) Neolithic Stone Balls: The Northern Rosetta Stone? | Ancient Origins (ancient-origins.net)
(cp) What did Stonehenge sound like? – BBC Travel
(cq) https://www.academia.edu/64551399/Researching_Stonehenge_Theories_Past_and_Present
(cr) https://www.academia.edu/75967939/New_Theory_About_Stonehenge_Stonehenge_Royal_Palace_Author_Dimitar_Alekseev_Dimitrov (link broken) See short video – Stonehenge explained by Bulgarian scientist Dimitar Al. Dimitrov! 2020 – YouTube
(cs) https://www.britam.org/Proof/Attributes/roleDolmen.html
(cu) https://www.academia.edu/96803677/The_Stonehenge_Builders_came_from_Turkey_so_whats_new
(cw) How Stonehenge was Really Built (archive.org)
(cy) (99+) What in the World is Stonehenge? | Austin A Mardon – Academia.edu
(cz) Moon may have influenced Stonehenge builders says English Heritage | News | University of Leicester
(da) e5604c_e9edea4f2c6f4777ae3928593180a77a.pdf (third-millennium.co.uk)
(db) Irish Conquests in Wales (libraryireland.com)
(dd) Stonehenge Was Built By Satan’s Giants, Creationist Claims | HuffPost Weird News